an online literary journal

Refuge

If sky darkens on a day when you have roamed too far,
if wind picks up, trembling leaves on familiar trees,

if lightning carves its fiery veins above your head,
if thunder explodes, and a fury of rain drenches you,

if you stumble in this wet misery on a street
that all but disappears, I offer you an open door,

and at my table, an honored place. If power lines
lie sizzling and snaking on the wet ground, we will

find lanterns and candles, some crusty bread
and plenty of wine. Together we can ride it out,

this storm that rose so suddenly. Others have already
come, shaken and storm-cursed, but warm now, and dry

in this well-built house, where voices study the daunting
language of hope, and new songs braid and rise, until fear

is sealed away, and a new, quiet courage spreads around
us, a lake glimmering at sunset, or moonlight in the spring.

—Steve Klepetar has received several nominations for Best of the Net and the Pushcart Prize, including four in 2016. Recent collections include My Son Writes a Report on the Warsaw Ghetto and The Li Bo Poems (both from Flutter Press). Family Reunion (Big Table) and A Landscape in Hell (Flutter Press) were released in January, 2017.

Perfect, Steve! Heard your voice here even before I read your name–this is exactly what we need to be for each other in these times–to give each other “shelter from the storm” Also an echo of Dylan here, always welcome!!